- Video
-
Club Roar
Captured a great grassroots sporting moment? We want to see it!Content Collections
The Roar Community
- Join
- Login
In my first piece I wrote on which teams I thought should join the A-League next. My main reason for writing this was the way that the last season was covered in the media and the way that it was portrayed.
Watching news coverage of the A-League last year sometimes felt like watching the new qualifying format at the Melbourne Grand Prix – where the focus was always on who was slowest rather than who was fastest.
The final three teams that were left at the end of the competition were Brisbane, Adelaide and Western Sydney who went through the season playing an attractive brand of attacking football inspired by the Spanish style.
But instead of this being the story the media often focused on the troubles of Central Coast, Newcastle and Wellington Phoenix as well as the form slump of Sydney FC who also had to play in the ACL.
When the A-League gets as little media attention as it does compared to the AFL and NRL it portrays a very poor image to the public. You have ten teams of which only nine are Australian and the bottom four are struggling or under performing.
How is the A-League supposed to attract new fans, sponsorship and broadcasting deals when that’s what people are seeing? It doesn’t inspire confidence that the A-League is worth investing in, or worth watching.
With the new broadcasting deal coming up next year the public conversation has turned to expansion as a way to bring new interest and money into the league.
Unfortunately the FFA hasn’t been forthcoming with its strategy for expansion going forward. All the public knows it that they want to “fish where the fishes are” and that they are looking at markets with millions of people – not hundreds of thousands.
So what is the FFA’s vision for the A-League in the future? What do they want the A-League to look like and how are they planning to achieve it? Do they want a large number of small teams in the big cities like the AFL and NRL, or do they want a small number of large blockbuster teams to fill big stadiums with a few regional teams to add balance and interest?
If you add Sutherland, Liverpool and others in Sydney then you just split the support base of FC and Wanderers and dilute the atmosphere in the stadiums, in which case they need to be smaller.
But if you build a 40-50,000 seat stadium in North Sydney and upgrade Parramatta Stadium to a similar number then you get three massive derbies in big stadiums and create an atmosphere the NRL would find difficult to match.
Add in fierce regional rivalries with Wollongong, Canberra and Newcastle as well as the Hawkesbury derby with Central Coast and it’s a pretty good competition without the risk of diluting the support of FC and Wanderers.
In Sydney there are nine NRL teams with just one in the north, as well as two AFL teams and two BBL teams all south of the Bridge. So there’s a big gap in the market in North Sydney that could be filled an A-League team.
The images on TV with the harbour and bridge as a backdrop to the fixture would also be attractive to sponsors, especially if the viewers are watching from overseas.
If the A-League develops and the larger teams can attract more big marquees then people in England and Europe could start to take interest like the BBL does in England, especially if the matches are timed so they start in the morning over there before their own matches start around midday.
Some people might suggest that people in North Sydney would have little interest in the A-League. But North Sydney Oval was once the home of the NSL team Northern Spirit FC where they managed to draw average crowds of 15,000 per game and got 19,000 in their first match against Sydney Olympic.
Two former members of the team were Graham Arnold the current coach of Sydney FC and Ian Crook who was previously the manager of Sydney FC but who has since gone on to be the current assistant manager of Wanderers. So there’s a bit of interesting history there if North Sydney makes a return to the national level.
This relationship could make FC, Wanderers and Spirit the A-Leagues three amigos. Or would they be ‘frenemies’? It would also be good if the North Sydney supporters group take after The Cove at Sydney FC and call themselves The Neutrals.
The FFA might not be forthcoming with what they want the A-League to look like, but what do people on this forum think? Would you rather have a small number of large teams who can fill big stadiums and have the ability to attract international stars like Dwight Yorke, David Villa and Alessandro Del Piero who could begin to market the A-League to an international audience?
Or would you rather have a large number of small teams with a grass roots feel like the old NSL? How many teams should there be in each city and what place is there for teams outside the capitols?
Sydney’s south has been identified as the most likely location for a new team but can Sydney support three or more teams south of the bridge, or would that just flood the market and weaken all of them?
Are you the ultimate team manager? Pick your own superstar team and go head to head with other football fans for glory and cash prizes on Draftstars. Imagine what you could be buying instead. Set a deposit limit.